Maureen Sheridan is a perceptual realist based in Kingston, Ontario. She is primarily known for her contemporary genre scenes of people and life in Canada. Regional nature experiences are her main inspiration, although her work includes series based on regular visits to Latin countries such as Portugal and Spain. Since graduating from the Queen's University Bachelor of Fine Art program in 1989 Sheridan has been exhibiting in solo and group exhibitions. Her work has won various awards, including a "Best Painting in Show" award at Toronto's Outdoor Art Exhibition. Her works are included in private and corporate collections in Canada, the U.S.A. and Europe.

Artist's Statement

The act of painting enables me to articulate my personal experience of place and people as well as analyze and distance myself from that experience. For me, painting is a dialogue between cognitive responses and subjective associations to a particular place and the feeling it evokes. I hope my personal interpretation of the world through painting will resonate with viewers and speak to their own experience.

Environment and experiences growing up shape a person. Having always lived by large bodies of water, the St. Lawrence River and Lake Ontario, I have developed an enduring fascination with water and my particular regional landscape. My painting could be termed “perceptual realist” in that the subject matter is specific. From mainly local sources I find meaningful subject matter. I tend to avoid narrative but try to be faithful to what Jack Chambers called the “ping” of perception–the moment when a complex scene is perceived as meaningful in all its detail as well as en masse, so that the artist can render it with fidelity, and convey the excitement of that moment to others. This is how inspiration works for me. My paintings are about specific yet timeless moments.